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The Dynastic Question

In a presidential campaign that has involved battles over everything from Iraq to driver’s licenses, one sweeping topic has gone curiously unexamined: Does it diminish American democracy if we keep the presidency in the same two families that have held it since 1989?

If Hillary Rodham Clinton serves two terms, then for 28 years the presidency will have been held by a Bush or a Clinton. By that point, about 40 percent of Americans would have lived their entire lives under a president from one of these two families.

Wouldn’t that make our democracy seem a little, er, Pakistani?

Naturally, views on this are influenced by politics. Clintonians who dismissed George W. Bush as a dynastic puppet see nothing wrong with another Clinton in the Oval Office. On the other hand, Obama fans who shiver at the prospect of a Clinton dynasty bask in endorsements from an even greater dynasty, that of the Kennedys.

Granted, nobody should be barred from the presidency because of his or her family connections. Franklin Roosevelt was an excellent president even though he certainly enjoyed a leg up because of his association with his distant cousin, Teddy Roosevelt. Yet shouldn’t there be a presumption against family members of former presidents — albeit a presumption that can be overcome if it were, say, Bobby Kennedy against Richard Nixon?

We Americans snicker patronizingly as “democratic” Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Singapore, India and Argentina hand over power to a wife or child of a former leader. Yet I can’t find any example of even the most rinky-dink “democracy” confining power continuously for seven terms over 28 years to four people from two families. (And that’s not counting George H.W. Bush’s eight years as vice president.)

Perhaps there is some such “democracy” somewhere: If you know of one, report it on my blog, and I’ll support you for president in eight years time ... and then your spouse ... and then your eldest child.

The counterargument goes like this: As voters, we should always choose the best person for the job. We should evaluate candidates on their own merits and not drag in their families. We punish ourselves if we spurn the best person because of his or her family background.

Photo

Nicholas D. KristofCredit
Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times

Yet we have faced this trade-off frequently over the last 215 years and regularly inclined on the side of fresh blood. In 1796, George Washington’s skill and popular mandate seemed invaluable at a perilous time in our nation’s infancy. Yet we overwhelmingly believe that it was good for American democracy that he stepped down after two terms.

As Thomas Jefferson put it: “in no office can rotation be more expedient” than in the presidency.

We remember John Quincy Adams as intelligent and diligent, but his presidency is diminished by the hint of dynastic succession and is seen as emblematic of a parochial time when America was ruled by an incestuous elite. Some day, I suspect we may detect the same narrowness in the rise of the Bush Dynasty and, if there is one, in the Clinton Dynasty.

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We added the 22nd Amendment, limiting presidents to two terms, on the rationale that levers of power should turn over to keep our democracy healthy. Many Democrats today would consider Bill Clinton intrinsically the best person to serve as president for the next eight years. And yet, even if there weren’t a 22nd Amendment, we would shy away from that; we prefer the risk of an unproven president to the risk of stasis and aristocracy.

A tongue-in-cheek Web site called Bush-Clinton Forever is already proposing Jeb Bush in 2017, Chelsea Clinton in 2025, Jeb Bush’s son George P. Bush in 2033, Chelsea Clinton’s husband in 2041 and George W. Bush’s daughter Jenna Bush from 2049-2057.

For those of us who admire Mrs. Clinton and believe she would make a terrific president, there are hard trade-offs involved. She has an utter mastery of domestic and foreign policy, and among the Democrats she knows military and security issues in particular better than anyone else. And if the concern is to bring in fresh currents into the political system, what better way than electing a woman president?

Certainly, it’s easy to see why voters nostalgic for peace and prosperity might yearn for a Clinton Restoration. Maybe we want another political dynasty, but we shouldn’t back into one without discussion — again.

When she is asked about the propriety of keeping the White House so long in the hands of two families, Mrs. Clinton’s standard response is that she agrees ... that it was a mistake to elect President Bush in 2000.

Mrs. Clinton has proven herself an excellent senator, and presumably would make a superior president. Yet ... 28 years ... two families! That needn’t be decisive, but it’s too important to be ignored.